


Regina's Birthday Surprise

by syrensoul_red



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Belligerent Sexual Tension, Disgruntled Emma, Emma swears like a sailor, Emma's strange obsession with baked goods, F/F, Magic Lessons, PS: I have no idea how long the rating will actually stay Mature, Probs will get hotter soon tbh, Sexual Content, Srsly screw those guys, Swan-Mills Family Fluff, Swan-Mills-Charming Family, There will be costuming, Women in suits, Wow, let's find out together, no beards, season 4-ish, so many trope
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-08
Updated: 2016-09-08
Packaged: 2018-08-13 19:28:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7983451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/syrensoul_red/pseuds/syrensoul_red
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During a magical lull in Storybrooke, things have gotten... Tense? Weird? -- for Emma and Regina. Mary Margaret and Henry have a plan underway, but it's terrible, and things might just get explosive.</p><p>"<i>Emma was tired of the low-shock electricity that buzzed between them. She was tired of the air that became too loaded to breathe-- Back when Regina’s intentions were murderous, those feelings were easy enough to explain: Any spark was anger, any frisson contempt and Emma knew what to do with that; she knew how to parry and vault, when to wield a sharp tongue or deliver a calculated blow - but it wasn’t like that anymore. This was different. </i></p><p><i>Emma was forced to ignore their tension in tighter and tighter spaces.</i>"<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	Regina's Birthday Surprise

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cfkaatje](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cfkaatje/gifts).



> So a lot went on for me this year... Yes, HHCYLM is still in progress, but this was a thing I really needed to do. I'll swing between both stories until they're done. And thanks for sticking around :)

Emma Swan crossed her leather boots on her desk and stared blankly around Storybrooke’s empty jailhouse, one hand tucked behind her head, listless.

A recent lull in magical activity meant the town had been weirdly quiet. It was great at first - Emma loved her extra downtime, spent it with Henry and her parents doing ordinary things, the everyday stuff she’d always imagined family life to be. But after a couple months, the novelty of having a daily routine wore off, and it became just that – routine. Emma didn’t really know what to do with herself when the dust settled. She’d never stayed in one place long enough to learn.

_Maybe if I poked something dark with a stick, or set something on fire…_

Emma hated to admit it, but she was _that guy_ \- the one who thrived on adrenaline, secretly thrilled to find another Big Bad hissed at her neck. She’d become accustomed to life at a ragged tempo, and outwitted mortality too many times to deny she enjoyed it. Now, maybe even a mad dash after a pickpocket wouldn’t be enough, but she’d take it. Frankly, she’d take anything. Emma re-checked the walkie at her belt, the voicemail light on her father’s phone, her cell, kinda hoped for any sign of trouble, but --  _Nothing. Nada. Quiet._

Emma threw a pen at the bowl across the room but it was already full, and it bounced out onto the floor with the others. She bit into her bear claw, and rued the fact the only dangerous thing she’d courted this week was coronary heart disease. The silence made her itch.

_Why am I even here? Why do we even have a Sheriff’s Station? Nobody comes here - I could be home sleeping right now..._

Emma had done a lot of that lately. It was the boredom maybe, or her body’s way of gorging on something she’d gone too long without. When she woke, it was with a restless energy. Emma ran then, expended her nervous tension into the cornered boundaries of this too-small town; chased the pound and slap of her joggers on wet pavement, the squelch and slide of slick forest back roads because at least it drowned out the static.

Her life had become easy. And it turned out easy was hard. The muscles a person grew to deal with tedium hadn’t grown in Emma, not yet.

Recently, she’d slipped into old bad habits. No longer able to rail against authority – given Emma was the authority here – she took out her frustration on innocent appliances; honed weird skills for the next big apocalypse. David had confiscated all the tools from their office last week and saved the life of their noisy drip-coffeemaker, but the office dartboard hung in tatters, a poorly thought-out venture with a nail gun Emma didn’t really want brought up again.

_Not the right place to rig a hair trigger._

Stuck in Storybrooke’s Sheriff’s Station, all Emma had to keep herself amused was the world’s slowest internet connection. She’d avoided it for weeks - not because of the excruciating load times and darkly uncomfortable porn suggestions, Emma was used to that. She was pretty sure Storybrooke stole its wifi from a no-tell motel just across the Town Line, or she hoped it was that, because these were not the Happy Endings fairytale characters were known for.

No, Emma had avoided her computer for this long because using it meant she’d have to do something she really did not want to do. It was the kind of plan that would not only come back to bite her in the ass, but would probably do it hard enough to draw large quantities of blood. The fact Emma even considered it now, meant she’d reached the insane far ledge of this cliff of boredom.

_Am I really that desperate for a little action?_

There were shadowy things you didn’t poke, villains you didn’t antagonise no matter the reasons and Emma knew that. But nothingness yawned around her, and it seemed the only way out was down.

_A gift-wrapped apocalypse could really liven up the place…_

Emma crossed her ankles more comfortably in the clutter, and pulled her ancient computer keyboard into her lap. She roused her screen to this nightmare.

_And hey, maybe dying isn’t so bad…_

It was time to find a birthday present for Regina-fucking-Mills.

_This is gonna be a goddamn disaster._

*

A month ago - that’s when it started.

At the time, Emma was too busy looking for danger in the darkened corners of Storybrooke to notice what was happening in her family’s small sunlit loft. Tempers were short, but never explosive enough to matter and a little space fixed most things. What Emma didn’t know, was there was a genetic element to her restlessness. They were all looking for a little noise in the silence. Her parents had never lived a quiet courtly life either, and all that energy had to go somewhere.

For Emma, video games with Henry still mostly took the edge off. David took up fishing with Hook, which was weird for Emma because she’d taken to not calling Hook back and he hadn’t noticed yet. Mary Margaret stepped down as Mayor, but seemed happy enough to raise baby Neal and do the housewife thing - she’d set up a craft room and spent a lot of time in there.

It happened on a boring Friday night, as they sat down for dinner. Insanity flooded their apartment.

Emma, an unwitting island awash in a sea of good food, of roasted meats and vegetables and gravy boats, the flagrant flotilla of family consumption - she’d just reached for the green beans, when Mary Margaret mentioned, so casually: _‘Regina’s birthday is coming up -- Would someone please pass the baked potatoes?’_

It was nothing.

It was benign.

Emma swiped at the comment thoughtlessly, joked about _spawning_ and _dinosaurs_ and – _‘Do we put candles on her cake, or just set the whole building on fire?’_

David had laughed. Henry seemed quiet though, and Emma was cowed by that because her kid loved his Mom and really, Emma knew better. She actually thought a few quiet drinks and a little cake might be a good thing, maybe even fun. It wasn’t like Regina didn’t deserve it, and they could all use the distraction. And she didn’t hate Regina's company. Recently, they’d spent a lot of time together.

It hadn’t been their choice in the beginning. After the lull set in, Henry’s requests for ‘Moms time’ couldn’t be avoided. They’d tried; Emma even shared her calendar so Regina could schedule-in conflicts. But eventually, their excuses ran out.

It was strained at first. That initial Wednesday night at Mifflin Street, Regina ushered Emma in from the cold and thanked her politely for the six-dollar bottle of crap Emma knew would be immediately thrown away. Neither of them wanted Emma to be there. And when Henry ran out of conversation, they floundered in the gap. But after a few weeks, after a little practice, it became manageable. Emma learnt not to perch her butt on Regina’s marble countertops, and Regina relaxed enough that once, she answered the door in her slippers. Her cooking more than made up for the rest.

Emma wasn’t against a birthday party then. Something small maybe, held here at the loft because at Mifflin Street Emma still wasn’t allowed to touch anything. The prospect of Regina bringing her lasagne direct to Emma’s home was the deciding factor, and she asked Mary Margaret what she wanted to do -- Emma expected streamers, a little singing, maybe some stupid hats - a family scrapbooking ‘fun night’ at the absolute worst.

_‘We’re going to hold a Town Ball!’_

Clattered silverware punctured the night. David choked on his beer, and Emma squeaked out: ‘ _Are you serious?’_ \-- but of course her mother was.

_Serious like a freakin’ heart attack._

Emma should’ve shouted ‘ _Man Down!’_ and crash-tackled Mary Margaret there on the floor, but she was too stunned to move. And then, Henry _loved_ the idea. He pounced on it, and his excitement grew like tiers on an insane cake; Mary Margaret urged him on, encouraged every wild suggestion with one of her own until he was so wound up in this thing Emma had no choice but to go along with it. She couldn’t crush her kid from this height. Mary Margaret knew that. It was a level of political manoeuvring most blood-thirsty dictators only dreamt of.

_Sweet and innocent Snow White my ass._

Then came the binders, these heavy A3 binders produced from fucking nowhere, because apparently that’s what Mary Margaret used her ‘craft room’ for – waging war. She’d already organised this bunting-filled shit-show. There were colour-coordinated decoration ideas and napkin swatches and a vast selection of fonts for the invitations she’d designed. She’d found a venue, somehow commissioned a stage; organised this Enchanted Forest-style, no-holds-barred regal blowout -- It would be, in Mary Margaret’s words: ‘ _The Ball to end all Balls…’_

_Balls._

Emma hated that word, always had. Now it sparked a jaw-clenched anxiety in her, stole pieces of her sanity she’d never get back. Not that Emma needed them here. This was crazy town.

_Nobody aged in Storybrooke for twenty-eight years, why can’t we go back to that?_

True clusterfuckery revealed itself only when her mother leant across David’s shoulder, insisted he choose between charcoal envelopes or steel grey; and David asked tentatively -- _‘How does Regina feel about this?’_

 _‘Oh, Regina doesn’t know. She can’t know--’_ And Mary Margaret smiled like David was the one who was crazy. ‘ _It’s going to be a surprise, silly!’_

The world rushed away from Emma then, into a long, dark tunnel. There was a light at the end, sure, but it was a train.

Emma had questions, like -- _Do you have a death wish? Why do you want to see your friends on fire? Exactly how much crack have you smoked today?_ – But her tongue refused to move, trapped between cracked lips, one eye squinted shut like she’d had a stroke. Maybe she had.

Sometimes, Emma dreamt she’d stood up at that point and simply walked out into the night, never to be heard from again. It was a good dream. Happy. But it hadn’t worked out that way.

Emma’s treacherous brain tripped into the logistics of the thing: Storybrooke was a small town, and outside of fishing, its biggest trade was gossip. One visit to Granny’s Diner and Emma knew more about Grumpy’s life than she did her own. She’d once wandered in on a discussion between Red and Sleepy about Dr Hopper’s transition to boxer-briefs and simply walked out again -- there was nothing this town wouldn’t talk about. It was leakier than a sunk ship.

Emma knew better than to ask things she didn’t want to know. She knew knowing those things made her complicit. She knew _never_ to question a crazy person. And yet…

‘ _How do you even keep a secret like that?’_ It was Emma’s stupid voice, and it startled her because she swore she’d kept her mouth shut. _‘Storybrooke is—Do we just put everyone on a boat? Do you wanna lock Regina in a room for six weeks? Because I don’t think she’d like that.’_

_Goddammit, Swan._

_‘We’ll make it a surprise for everyone!’_ And Mary Margaret was all excited fist shakes and tiny fingertip claps. _‘Then an hour into the ball—’_

_‘An hour? How--’_

_‘--I’ll get the heralds to sound their trumpets—’_

_‘We have heralds now??’_

_‘—and a banner will drop - David, you’ll need to rig the banner -- And then the balloons will fall – fifty or sixty should do, just enough to cover the stage—’_

_‘How freakin’ big is this stage?’_

_‘—and then Henry can wheel out the cake, and I’ll start singing Happy Birthday because I know everyone will be a little stunned—’_

_‘Ya THINK?’_ Emma’s voice was ragged, high-pitched.

Mary Margaret glared at her. _‘It’s a surprise party, Emma. People will be surprised. But they’ll be happy.’_

_‘Oh yeah, because people in this town really love false pretences…’_

Emma wasn’t being the fun police - she was seriously worried. There was a darker truth here Mary Margaret refused to see. Emma knew what drove it. Regina had changed a lot these last couple years, they all had. There was a reason Mary Margaret brought up the former-Evil Queen’s birthday now, after apparently knowing all this time the exact date Regina was spawned – _‘Birthed, Emma. Whatever you think of Cora, and I know she acted like a demon, Regina is just as human as the rest of us…’--_ They were entwined enough now that silly things like birthdays somehow mattered.

Heroes and villains weren’t meant to form bonds. But by the third or fourth, or maybe the eighth time the Swan-Charming-Millses had banded together to save Storybrooke, divides became murky. Hatred, indifference was difficult to maintain; Henry unravelled the rest. There was something about having this amazing kid in their lives that made it impossible not to forgive Regina, not to let her back in. She’d earnt her right to be there.

But not everyone saw that. Not everyone knew what Regina did to save this town, not everyone was so forgiving. Most of them would rather kill Regina than celebrate her life, and it wasn’t an unwarranted feeling. Dragged here by Regina’s Curse, forced to live in a painful loop of her vengeance; separated from family members and constantly bombarded by Today’s Big Evil-- Most of them didn’t know this Regina. They didn’t _want_ to know her.

Mary Margaret was blinded by her optimism. She honestly believed a few wistful speeches and a fuck-tonne of cake would prevent a town mob, even though forming a mob was Storybrooke’s favourite pastime. ‘ _Good for morale_ ,’ she insisted. _‘Acknowledging how far we’ve come; healing old wounds together…’_

Emma wondered how good for morale it would be if a cornered Regina Mills set everyone on fire. She was pretty sure the new wounds would be more fatal than the old ones.

But the truth behind Emma’s glibness came from Mary Margaret’s earlier words: _Regina was human_. She was all too human. She was far less impervious than she pretended to be, and certainly not the cold, calculating demon they expected. Emma had learnt that the hard way. Regina felt even accidental slights more keenly than most, and Emma had a habit of saying and doing things that were unintentionally damaging because she rarely thought them through. She and Regina had the capacity to hurt each other without ever throwing a punch. Lately, they’d tried to fix things as soon as they were broken - it was awkward and uncomfortable and Emma wished they could stop.

So it wasn’t the potential for a town riot that worried her, or the probability that Regina would violently defend herself – Emma had guns for that. She’d already planned her outfit to include them. The problem was, this whole thing set Regina up to fail. By not giving people the choice to avoid celebrating her, there was no way someone wouldn’t speak up or lash out on the night. Emma didn’t want to care, but she did. She just didn’t know how to put that into words here. She didn’t know how to explain all of that to her mother, not without exposing… Emma didn’t know. She tried not to think about it mostly.

It was Henry who broke through the crap. He’d been quiet as they argued, lanky arms on the table, chin propped in palms that weren’t so chubby anymore. He was a thoughtful kid, and now he was a smart teen. Tonight, Emma was grateful for that. ‘ _What if they don’t want to be there?’_ Henry asked softly. _‘What if they don’t sing, or…’_

He stopped, stricken; and Emma leant back in her chair, stretched one arm across the wood behind him - she was furious it had gotten to this.

_‘What if they boo my Mom? Or what if they throw things at her, or just walk out, I don’t-- Mom isn’t-- I don’t think it’s fair on her. I don’t think that’s fair on anyone.’_

Emma tugged him over and kissed his head – she was proud. And relieved, because Mary Margaret actually listened. They talked through a lot of stuff after that; slowly, tentatively they made changes – not enough in Emma’s opinion, but things got better. Eventually, they’d agreed Regina’s birthday would be a small part of The Ball, but not its main focus. The banner and balloons would be confined to the cake trolley and no one would sing. Henry would make a speech -- Anyone who booed him got a one-way trip to Storybrooke’s Jail.

But the element of surprise was non-negotiable. Emma wasn’t happy about that. Even scaled down, the problems with a surprise party remained. But it was her kid’s show now, so Emma would fight to the death for it.

_I am wearing so many guns that night…_

By the end, Emma was at least resigned, and there was still dessert which always improved her mood. David had been roped into doing most of The Ball’s grunt work, since Emma made it clear she wanted no part of this and David didn’t have that choice - he was married to the crazy person. All Emma had to do was cover David’s shifts and keep her mouth shut, which wouldn’t be a problem since Emma planned to act just as shocked by this thing as Regina was. It was safer that way.

Except, Henry wasn’t done.

Emma shovelled in a mouthful of whipped cream and blueberry pie, and her kid added: _‘If Mom’s birthday party is a surprise, then no one is bringing her presents. I don’t think it’s really a birthday without presents...’_

Emma disagreed - she’d had a lot of birthdays without presents. She wanted to tell her 13-year-old son to go fuck himself, but the pie made it impossible and in hindsight, that was probably a good thing.

 _‘You’re right, Henry.’_ Mary Margaret nodded like she hadn’t thought of that. _‘I guess we’re all buying Regina presents then.’_

Emma choked on her food.

_Well, fuck._

*

_What do you get the woman who takes everything?_

Emma fidgeted her boots on a stack of neglected paperwork and knew the thought wasn’t fair to Regina, but she was pissed. Emma hated buying presents. She’d once blown out the engine of her car in the middle of buttfuck-nowhere just to avoid the birthday weekend of a guy she was dating; and when he said she could make it up to him later, she’d simply moved to Indiana...

_Still worth it._

This time, leaving town wasn’t an option.

Emma had a life here, a family; a vested interest in making sure no one she knew died and a Town Line that was impossible to cross if she ever wanted back. Emma was pissed about all of that. She was pissed about everything.

She reached for her coffee, blew into it even though it was lukewarm, absently cradled it in her hands. Her internet search so far had turned up nothing. She’d trawled the Big Box stores but couldn’t use them - the weird magical properties of Storybrooke’s Town Line screwed with the postal service, and the few things that came here usually arrived by bird -- _because of course they friggin’ did_. Strangely enough, nobody offered ‘bird delivery’ in the real world.

But she kept going, she had to - the more Emma dragged her feet on this, the more her mother made not-so-subtle threats about her future, and Mary Margaret wasn’t above moving a teething baby Neal into Emma’s room, or ordering Granny to pull all the baked goods from her menu. A life without pastries was no life at all.

Besides, Emma had promised Henry she’d back him on this thing. And maybe it was crazier than dragons or Evil Curses or that one time Emma wore a pastel-pink dress on a date with a pirate, but she wasn’t about to break a promise to her kid. Emma was in.

But Google was out. Emma mashed her feelings at her keyboard - a long string of angry consonants followed by the infinite depression of her spacebar. She swigged her coffee like a desperate sailor swigged whiskey and she wished it was that, because at least if she were drunk right now, this whole process could be lost in a blackout fog.

_What do you get the former Villain who doesn’t necessarily want to kill you anymore?_

With her shopping choices limited to Storybrooke, Emma still needed to find that delicate balance between ‘ _I’ve put too much thought into this gift’_ and _‘obviously I give no shits about you’_ \-- It wasn’t a skill she’d mastered. She needed help, but couldn’t ask for it because that was a level of invested Emma didn’t want to be in this thing. She didn’t want to be invested in Regina at all.

They were too wound up in each other already -- too much time spent together, too much effort put in. Once Wednesday-night dinners became an almost ‘normal’ part of life, Emma kind of got used to chatting around Regina’s dining table, just mindless stuff that pre-empted any awkward lull; and at some point, she guessed she lost her sense of self-preservation. The night she mentioned her need to be better prepared magically before the next Big Evil hit town, it was idle conversation - but Henry lit up like a firecracker.

_‘Mom! You should teach Emma how to use her magic -- Properly this time...’_

Regina glared fiery annihilation over Henry’s head at her. Emma tried to sink far enough into her chair that the table swallowed her, but all she managed to do was clatter her boots against Regina’s kicked-off heels; and when Regina’s nostrils flared, Emma clenched her jaw, fought rolled eyes. It wasn’t like she’d meant for any of this to happen. No part of Emma wanted to put herself any closer to Regina than she already was.

Not _purposefully._

Henry pushed the idea all through dinner, and for a while they waved it off, but they couldn’t deny it made sense. There wasn’t much else for a Mayor or Savior to do without a Big Bad tearing up the place, and for once no one openly despised each other. No good argument could be made against it. Magic lessons at Regina’s Vault were going to become a thing.

Regina finally agreed over dessert; magnanimous, her smile stiff. She reserved her real ire for when Emma left the house that night; just before she closed the heavy oak door, she hissed -- _‘I hope you understand what you’ve just gotten us into, Em-ma…’_

_Fucking no, explain it to me._

Emma left irritated and on-edge, kicked the gate shut behind her. There was no way this thing was ever going to be easy.

The following Friday, it took her two hours to get to the vault because she’d turned around and driven home again some twenty times. Emma claimed car trouble, which wasn’t completely a lie and since Regina hated her _‘yellow tin can’_ anyway, the excuse was accepted.

It was just as isolated and creepy as Emma remembered. Once they’d gotten inside, Emma ignored all the rules again and touched everything in sight, a vestigial teenage defiance Regina always brought out in her. Of course they fought about it, bickered really, one of those substrate battles for dominance they’d become so quietly good at. It was all pretty standard.

But the truth was, they’d worked well together.

Regina was patient with her, stunningly so. The basics had always frustrated Emma and she wasn’t about to hide that - but when something didn’t work, Regina simply changed her approach. It was disconcerting-- Emma kept expecting Regina to just give in and collapse another bridge under her, or do anything that provoked that reactionary spark of magic, but it never happened. It was like Regina’s Vault was another world, this strange place where the only history that mattered was between the pages of old books, and where sucking at things wasn’t a good enough reason to quit trying. It was like they were different people there.

Emma was never sure how to take that.

With Regina’s help, she gained a lot more control over her magic. Emma worked on her concentration, on her form, on the goddamn Elvish crap that tangled up her tongue -- She learnt not to fidget. She learnt to think things through before she tried them - she learnt to take a pillow to protect her ass from the stone floor. Eventually, Emma learnt to summon a fireball just long enough to warm her hands. She found less and less at the vault to fight against.

When Emma got home after those long afternoon sessions, she drank.

_A lot._

Scotch, mostly - she’d tried beer but it never quite took the edge off. Spirits at least left Emma at a livewire exhaustion, the high-tensile cable of her body collapsed into something manageable, which was all she could ask. The magic was hard. It was hard for a lot of reasons, but mostly it was the lessons themselves that took the toll. Being at the vault required things from Emma she didn’t really have, needed a level of restraint she hadn’t used in a long time. In the end, that had little to do with the magic.

Mostly, it was about Regina.

Emma was tired of the low-shock electricity that buzzed between them. She was tired of the air that became too loaded to breathe-- Back when Regina’s intentions were murderous, those feelings were easy enough to explain: Any spark was anger, any frisson contempt and Emma knew what to do with that; she knew how to parry and vault, when to wield a sharp tongue or deliver a calculated blow - but it wasn’t like that anymore. This was different.

Emma was forced to ignore their tension in tighter and tighter spaces.

But she refused to flinch. Every week she went back because she couldn’t not go, not without a good explanation and Emma didn’t have one, not for Regina and definitely not for Henry - she didn’t really have one for herself. She was tired, yet had all this excess energy and it had to go somewhere, so she upped her time in the woods, ran increasingly long miles through Storybrooke’s deserted backroads. She threw herself into work and family, into target practice and video games and an endless sugar buzz that fizzed beneath her skin. Most days, a heightened sense of Regina could be pushed down like anything else.

For the rest, there was alcohol.

Emma lifted her takeaway coffee cup to her lips and the liquid was cold. She summoned a small swirl of power, just enough to warm the dregs and for once, the cardboard didn’t smoulder – _There’s also that._ Her time at Regina’s Vault wasn’t wasted. Sure, she couldn’t firebomb the Ball venue on her own before the big night - something she’d seriously considered; but Emma could hold her own if a magical firefight broke out and that was something.

In the end, Henry was all that really mattered. Every time she and Regina tried, it made him happy. Their kid was worth it.

Emma checked her watch -- _Nearly 6pm…_ The end of a normal working day for most people; and while Emma still had another shift ahead of her, thanks to her father serving the insanity that was her mother - she couldn’t just sit there. She needed to patrol sometime, if for no other reason than a grilled cheese sandwich and a Meatloaf Special required her attention, and Granny refused to deliver to the Sheriff’s Station during the dinner rush.

But Emma still hadn’t found a place to even look for Regina’s birthday present. She hammered _‘Storybrooke blows’_ into her search bar and drained the last of her coffee. Porn results flooded her screen.

_Not really the gift idea I was going for…_

Under the circumstances, simply tying a bow around herself probably wasn’t an appropriate course of action. Not that Emma had seriously considered it - maybe once when she was really drunk, just to see what Regina would do. Just to screw with her in ways that Regina had started. Not that Emma noticed when Regina stood too close to her at the vault. Emma had never shivered into Regina’s breath, brazenly hot against her ear; had never collapsed into the ache of her own thighs when satin breasts brushed her spine. She’d never thought about Regina’s gravelled voice until her hips burnt, because Regina never affected her, never drove her to the frantic press of her own hands, had never--

Emma cleared her throat loudly. She tucked stray hair behind both ears, glared at her smudge-marked computer screen like this was its fault; crossed her rigid arms over her chest. There had to be something there she’d missed. This dry-spell delusion was not the answer.

Storybrooke was a town full of fairytale characters who had lived most of their lives without running water, let alone electricity, but it wasn’t completely archaic. Emma remembered murkily being stuck in a Town Hall where the Business Board complained about a lack of services, about the need to fuel their economy in an insular online environment or… _something_ – _God that meeting was boring_. Emma was pretty sure they’d voted that day, for an internet business-whatever -- She’d only stayed because Regina brought a tray of home-baked sweet chicharrones, then guarded it with a letter opener until the voting was done. It was the kind of bribery Emma was susceptible to, and she’d made her peace with that.

Emma reached for the last of her bear claw, gripped it between her teeth and resettled the keyboard on her crossed thighs. With Safe Search on she’d narrowed the results; assured Google she did not in fact mean _‘Storybook’_ and squinted past anything with _‘oral tradition’_ in the title… She found it. Storybrooke’s Online Business Directory. _SOBD._

_How accurate._

The homepage Emma clicked into was a hideous demon-child of Geocities gif art and lumbering bureaucracy, the kind of tech-savvy-circa-1990s aesthetic that spattered this town - but at least it existed. _You beautiful, tedious little trolls._

She nudged her empty coffee cup into the trashcan beside her desk with her boot and cracked her knuckles -- the faster Emma got this shit done, the faster she convinced herself this was some Curse-addled fever dream and not the living nightmare it really was.

_What do you get the person who shouldn’t be so goddamn wrapped up in your life?_

Emma already knew a Granny’s Diner gift certificate wouldn’t cut it. She’d been told as much multiple times by both her mother and Henry - at this point, Mary Margaret could go to hell, but Emma still wanted to impress her kid.

She wasn’t exactly sure what Henry wanted from her, only that it was _more_. Each time Emma asked him what that meant, Henry insisted he ‘trusted her judgement’, which was fucking terrible because she could not be trusted on this thing. In the past, she’d considered buying Regina a box of live crickets, or this book she’d found at the library called _‘How to Grow A Heart: On empathy in a cruel world’_. Both of these made Emma snicker, but probably led to fireballs.

Emma found herself on Marco’s Custom Carpentry homepage before she’d even realised she’d clicked the link.

It wasn’t where she was supposed to be -- Everything there was hand-crafted and expensive, the kind of big-ticket items you bought for weddings or palace fit-outs, not surprise birthday parties for people who wanted to stab you-- Emma knew shit about gifting, but she knew that. Whatever she bought would only piss Regina off anyway, just by way of context and location, so going all-out seemed a little unnecessary, or maybe too… Desperate? _Revealing?_

Emma snorted at herself. She scrolled through Marco’s catalogue anyway, ate her bear claw absently as she admired the clocks and furniture he’d designed. Each piece was more intricate than the last, sometimes so impressive that Emma’s mouth hung open mid-chew. This was _art_.

Emma had actually spent a lot of time around art, once. She’d never had the space for it herself - Tchotchkes being the exception, though they weren’t really the same thing. But when she was young and mostly unsupervised, she’d regularly escaped into the city, where a lot of cold winter days drove her to Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts. There, Emma pretended to be wanted next to unattached adults, followed them into guided tours because the guards were less likely to kick her out. She’d watched people _ooh_ and _aah_ over absolute crap just because it was made by famous artists, and discovered she lacked the sentimentality to feel a paint-splattered canvas in her guts.

The statues though… Emma’s exceptions were always the statues. She kind of lost herself in them, in marbles and bronzes where the bodies looked ready to run, honed to fight their way out of this place if only they were armed. She’d forgotten herself once and touched one, just to see if it was warm, and gotten her ass swiftly booted into the snow. After that, she mostly spent her time at libraries and coffeehouses.

So Emma knew basically jack about art - but she knew it wasn’t a thing you chose for other people. Especially not for people like Regina Mills. The woman had fine taste practically coming out her ass; an ass that was so finely sculpted Emma kept her hands in her back pockets most of the time. Not that that had anything to do with anything. It was just that Regina was chic, gathered up elegant things without really trying, while Emma still kept her jewellery in an old tackle tin she’d had since she was ten.

Emma was about to click away from Marco’s page, but something caught her. Wedged between an elaborately carved cot and a chest of drawers with forest creatures on it, was a statue of a horse.

_Holy shit._

It was… Emma didn’t really have words for it. A stallion rampant carved in dark wood -- Even though the picture was grainy, Emma saw the fine detail in its shaken mane, its huffed nostrils, the forequarters raised and muscled ready to strike. Emma knew Regina had a thing for horses, a complicated thing which meant she never rode them anymore, but kept a lot of pictures and miniatures around the place anyway. This thing was perfect. All Emma needed to do was click the Buy Now button, and her problematic search was over.

She couldn’t find one.

_Are you freaking KIDDING ME?_

Emma tapped the image again and again, fingers a bombstrike on bad business modelling; bit painfully at her lower lip and just about cried when a new window finally popped open.

“ _Miss Swan?_ ”

_Oh for fuck’s sake._

Regina’s voice echoed from down the hall, from the kitchenette where admittedly Emma could usually be found. Emma’s knees jiggled irritation, anxiety on the cluttered surface of her desk. She held the keyboard so tightly she thought it cracked a little, and muttered under her breath for speed as a more detailed description of the statue loaded slowly on her screen.

_Sonuvabitch - this internet is connected directly to hell…_

“Emma? Are you here?”

Regina’s heels rang loudly against the hardwood floor, an ominous approach that pounded in Emma’s ears as she got closer. Marco’s new page read ‘Price on Request’, and Emma almost tossed her computer screen across the room, city property be damned. She pressed the button to enquire and the old computer whirred, struggled to open an email browser Emma never intended to use.

_FUCKING MARCO— Goddammit! Why is everything so hard all time?_

Regina appeared in the doorway, and when she saw Emma with her boots up on her desk and pastry crumbs on her shirt, at home in an office that resembled a hoarder’s nest - she seemed kinda pissed. Regina crossed her arms over her chest, molten ire in narrowed eyes and Emma panicked - for some reason, she didn’t know why, she dumped the keyboard from her knees into her trashcan.

It distracted Regina. She stared at it, open-mouthed; as did Emma, unsure what possessed her to make the move - but she was stuck with it now, so Emma pushed the last of her bear claw into her mouth to cover lies and shrugged belligerently. “Computer trouble,” she mumbled out.

Regina glared. She walked slowly into the room, stepped carefully over the pens strewn across the floor without pause. “You’ve wracked-up a lot of overtime recently. I see it’s been put to good use.” Regina’s tone made it clear that none of her positive words were at all what she’d meant.

Emma shrugged lazily, folded her arms over the mess of her shirt. “David’s had some stuff to do, so I figured I’d take up the slack.”

Regina raised one perfect eyebrow, and they both knew ‘slack’ was really the operative word. The bin beside the coffeemaker overflowed with takeaway cups, paper pastry bags and old filters, and a fine layer of dust covered the open cell doors. Emma made a mental note to get one of the dwarves in to spruce up the place.

Regina stalked her way to Emma’s desk. Her charcoal skirt-suit and five-inch heels screamed _this Mayor will kill you_ , while the red shirt buttoned dangerously low suggested her preferred method. Emma’s eyes darted between that and the email window that had finally opened on her screen. She searched frantically for her mouse -- “Can I help you with something Regina? I’m kinda snowed in here.”

“I can see that.” Regina pushed a pile of paperwork from the edge of Emma’s desk, and perched her ass in the space.

Emma screamed silently into gritted teeth, ignored the way the skirt rode up Regina’s thigh. A subtle hint of expensive perfume suggested Regina had been at a business meeting, but said nothing about why she was _here_. Regina turned her head quickly and caught a glimpse of Emma’s screen. Emma lashed out at it, held in the power button until it went black.

Regina’s breath was almost frosty as she spoke. “I see your email is working perfectly. I presume if I checked your phone, that would also be fine?”

Emma fidgeted; rubbed the back of her neck, brushed sticky crumbs from her chest onto the floor. “Look Regina…” She bit her bruised lip. “Yeah look I’m sorry, I know I haven’t returned your calls lately, it’s just…” Emma trailed off, because she hadn’t really thought this through. It was dumb, because she’d known this was coming; Emma had avoided dinners and magic lessons for nearly two weeks without notice, had simply asked Henry to cover for her. But she’d kind of hoped Regina would be so relieved to see the back of her, that she wouldn’t question the _why_ of it.

_Apparently not._

Emma puffed air, tired exasperation. “Since the town’s been pretty quiet, and I have all this paperwork to catch up on, I thought—”

“ _I_ thought,” Regina interrupted coldly, “that we were making headway with your magic skills, and that was something you wanted.” Regina twisted at the waist, further strained her buttons, her fingertips sharp on Emma’s desk. “I _thought_ , that you were taking our magic lessons seriously. Perhaps I was wrong.”

Anger bit at Emma’s brow. She pushed back in her chair, crossed her arms tightly, muscles tensed. “I _was_ taking it seriously, Regina - I _am_. It’s just that David needed time with Mary Margaret and the baby, and since we’re the only two people here with badges, I can’t exactly leave this place unattended.”

It was bullshit and they both knew it.

Regina stiffened at the lie, straightened slowly; stood almost regally. If Emma hadn’t known her so well, she might’ve missed the pinched hurt at the corners of Regina’s eyes. Emma wanted to leave it that way, really tried to because if Regina wasn’t talking to her, then keeping Henry and Mary Margaret’s secret got a lot easier.

But she couldn’t do it.

_Goddamnit Swan._

“Regina…” Emma stood abruptly, hands pushed deep into her jeans pockets and shoulders hunched to her ears. “Hey, I’m sorry ok? I know we were supposed to meet tomorrow – we can if you still want to? I could be at your vault around three-thirty…”

Regina paused at the end of Emma’s desk. She smoothed down her suit-jacket as though she no longer cared, brushed imaginary dirt from its perfect lapels. But her jaw clenched rhythmically, and she combed her dark hair back with rough fingers. “Fine. But ‘around’ three-thirty won’t do – either you’re there exactly at three-thirty, or I won’t be.”

Burnt-wood eyes caught Emma’s reluctant gaze and held it forcefully. “If you’re thinking of changing your mind, Emma, _don’t_. I won’t reschedule again. I have better things to do with my time than work around your… _whatever it is_ you’re doing here.” Regina turned on her heel, waved her arm at the pens on the floor and they scattered from her path. Emma rolled her eyes at that; forced herself to look away from Regina’s arrogantly swayed hips as she exited.

_Well, that went about as shitly as I’d expected..._

Emma dropped back into her chair. She rescued her keyboard from the trashcan and switched-on her computer screen, waited while it flickered back to life. Marco’s mailto price enquiry was still there. But Emma hesitated.

The horse statue was probably too much – not the price, at least not in cash terms. But the rest of it; the knowing Regina well enough to know that this was the _perfect_ gift for her, the giving a shit about Regina’s reaction when she saw it – that part cost Emma, and it had to stop. This was exactly the kind of crap she’d avoided her whole life. Up until now, she’d been pretty successful.

It was too easy for Emma and Regina to get under each other’s skins; to prod at exposed nerves with an almost surgical precision. Emma never wanted that. What they needed was to be away from each other as much as possible, until the next Big Bad came along - and even then they should only team up if it was absolutely necessary. The surprise party, the wooden statue, the dinners – these were all incendiary parts in a gasoline situation. Emma refused to participate anymore.

She closed the unsent email and shut down her computer. What she needed to do was finally suck it up and drag her sorry ass down to Gold’s shop; pick the cheapest item from the shelves that wasn’t tacky but still meant nothing, and then leave it somewhere obvious in her room. Emma would go to tomorrow’s magic lesson at Regina’s vault – And then break both her legs on the way home. Or her neck, she hadn’t ruled anything out. But Emma was done with this shit. One way or another, she was out.

Her stomach growled, hunger and irritation; Emma completely agreed. It was time for her to get the fuck out of here.

_A Sheriff’s gotta eat. And patrol…_

Emma grabbed a set of cruiser keys from David’s desk as she passed, because even though her body ached to run, she was still on duty. At least this way when she stopped in at Gold’s before Granny’s, it looked official.

_Presents for fucking everyone._

Emma pulled on her leather jacket from the coat stand by the door.

_I could always rob a place; make a little work for myself._

She slipped her gun into its holster and covered it with her shirt.

_Gonna drink til I pass out tonight, then do Advil and eggs for breakfast._

Emma had a plan. She hit the station lights as she left.

*****

 

_Like it so far? Please let me know. There's plenty more to come :)_


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